Your Etsy target audience – a guide to finding your perfect Etsy customer

Defining your Etsy target audience is one of the most important tasks when setting up your Etsy shop.

Consequently, the better you understand your niche the more closely you can focus your products and marketing to address the needs of your audience and the more powerful you’ll be.

So, I want to share the exact steps I use to understand who my perfect customer is.

Therefore, I’ve created a super helpful worksheet for you too which you can print out and use to define your own Etsy target audience.  Find it here:

Etsy target audience: understand who you are selling to

Understanding who you are selling to is crucial for a successful Etsy shop.

In other words, you are aiming to create an experience where your customer says, “That’s just what I was looking for.”

Also, you want them to wonder how you read their mind and how you knew this is what they needed.

So, for this to happen you need to understand your customer completely.  That is to say, you need to know their fears, their hopes and what they are thinking and needing.

This way you can create a brand and streamline your marketing that addresses exactly what your customers need and want.

Although there is a huge audience available to you, you want to imagine one person you focus on serving.

Just ONE person.

Because if you have a larger group you’re trying to market to, then you risk diluting your focus.

In trying to attract everyone, you’ll end up attracting no one.

Narrowing down to one person means you can be focused in understanding what this person wants and needs.

Identify an ideal customer that makes up your Etsy target audience

I’ll walk you through a simple process that identifies a clear ideal customer that your business serves.  Overall, you’ll define a specific person that you want to reach with your products.

You do need to get really specific here in order to see results. 

It’s really important that your ideal customer should be developed from audience research, not just guesswork.

So, how do you find this person?

Well, I’ve created a worksheet for you to use to help you define your ideal customer.  You can get it here:

Make up an imaginary ideal customer

You are now going to define one person and from that determine how you can connect with them.

So, make up an imaginary customer person who values what you have to offer and write a detailed description of them.

Certainly, it might help if you think of an ideal existing customer.  What makes them a perfect fit for your business?  Do they have traits that you value?  Imagine a person that you know you can serve because you know what they need and want.

Some information that you could gather would be:

• Age – no need to be specific, just know the decade or generation
• Location and time zone – where are your customers in the world and what time are they active? Where do they hang out online?
• Spending power – how much money do they have to spend? What influences their buying decisions?
• Interests – what do they like to do in their free time? What books do they read? Are there podcasts they listen to?  What blogs do they follow?
• Problems – what are their biggest pain points and frustrations?
• Inspiration – who inspires them?

Really dig in.

To help with this, you might like to identify who is already buying your products.  As soon as you understand the characteristics of your existing customers, you can target more of the same audience. 

If you don’t have a social media following that you can survey, then you can investigate online. What are people talking about?  Are they asking certain questions? Do they have any challenges?  Great places to find this information are:

• Comments on competitors’ blogs
• Completed questionnaires from existing customers
• Forums related to your niche
• Quora and Reddit

Contact your ideal customer

Next, after you’ve identified some ideal customers, it would be great if you could Skype call some of them and interview them directly. See if you can find anyone who will agree to this and I promise you, the value you’ll get from it will be enormous.

Furthermore, ask questions that draw out what your ideal customer wants, what they’ve tried in the past, what they’re planning to do in the future, and what their pain points are.  Talk about your product with this small Etsy target audience and get their feedback on what they think about it.

Aim to carry out 8 – 10 interviews in order to home in on what your ideal customer needs.

Create products specifically for your Etsy target audience

In conclusion, once you’ve identified your target customer, you’ll know what she needs; how she thinks, how much she is able to spend; her values as well as any objections she has.

You’ll be able to create products for her knowing that they’re going to add value to her life.

You can write all of your emails to her.  In fact, you’ll know her so well you’ll be talking to her in your sleep!

Have a look at my other posts designed to help you grow a profitable Etsy business.

• Your Etsy product description – a how to write guide
• Etsy business – how to be profitable selling printables
• Photos for digital products – an Etsy guide